Speculative Fiction—an all-encompassing genre created to describe stories of science fiction, fantasy, alternate history, and other stories that have an element of “What if...” in them. A story in speculative fiction is one that adds an element of the unreal, or asks, what would become of our society if history took a different direction at some important event? Fiction with a little something extra thrown in.—William D. Richards

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Saturday, April 21, 2018

Perimeter (Joe Ballen, Book 2) by David M. Kelly

Release date: April 21, 2018

Subgenre: Science fiction thriller, Space colonisation

About Perimeter:

PERIMETER - Deceit has no boundaries
Joe
Ballen’s working on a new ore-processing platform in the harsh
environment around Mercury. When a savage Atoll attack decimates his
crew, Joe is injured and must return to Earth to recover. While it’s a
setback for the project, at least it means he can rebuild his
relationship with his wife after nearly a year away.

But then
the security forces come calling. Vital starship engineering files are
missing, and without them Earth has no hope of escaping Atoll
domination. Someone has to locate the files, and Ballen is bulldozed
into the not-so-choice assignment.

But he’s not the only one
in the hunt. As Joe struggles to find the data, he becomes tangled up in
a high-stakes game of cat and mouse. It’s a journey that will take him
to the perilous depths of space, where no one is quite what they seem.
Can old enemies ever make good allies? And can Joe trust even the people
closest to him?

Ballen’s back in another action-packed sci-fi noir thriller, guaranteed to keep you turning the pages.

Excerpt:

I waited while Delacort thought about it.
Running on batteries would mean the railguns and lasers would be useless after
a few shots and, unless we got impossibly lucky, there'd be nothing left of us
except for a cloud of trace elements drifting slowly inward to fry in the Sun.
I knew he'd want to make a stand, his tightly muscled jawline delivered that
message clearly.

"We have to be able to fight.
Forty-eight rockets aren't going to save us on their own," he finally
said.

"Forty-eight rockets, four railguns
and two lasers doesn't sound much more effective."

Delacort lifted his chin. "Do you have
an alternative?"

"Sure. Surrender. The Atolls don't
want to kill us, they want to confine us. If we turn ourselves in they'll
either hold us or send us back to Earth. Knowing how much they hate us, I
imagine they'll send us home with our collective tails between our legs."

Delacort stiffened. "You're a
coward."

Why is self-preservation always dismissed
as cowardice? After surviving what I'd been through a few years earlier, was it
any surprise I didn't feel like offering myself on the altar of destruction
once again? "You're the one with the military background. What chance do
we have? We're on a space station. We can't avoid their attacks or do any fancy
escape orbits. We have limited weapons and a small crew. But they can maneuver
freely and outgun us at least ten to
one. If we had a fighting chance I'd raise a flag on the ramparts myself, but
this is suicide."

"We might get lucky."

I nodded slowly. "Has Central
dispatched a rescue ship yet?"

"What? No. Why would they? Nothing's
happened. SecOps doesn't have ships waiting in line to nanny a bunch of nervous
engineers."

The truth was we didn't have any ships to
speak of, but that wasn't relevant to the point I was making. "They know
our situation—we have virtually no chance of winning this fight. Some might
survive in the Rabbit Hole, but you know how limited the time frame is. Earth
could send a ship now to pick up the pieces, but they haven't. Why?"

I let him ponder the question and come to
his own conclusions. Picking up my comm-set, I signaled Isabell.

"Prepare everyone to head for the
Rabbit Hole. There's an Atoll ship on the way and they're not looking to get a
tan."

Isabell sounded calm. "How long?"

"Eight hours, maybe."

"Will do."

Isabell disconnected, and I looked back at
Delacort. He pulled a cloth from his pocket and mopped his forehead.
"Central doesn't expect anyone to be left here. You're right."

"I'm glad you saw sense." I moved
towards the hatch. "Let's get to the radio room and broadcast our
surrender."

"That's not what I mean. Charge all
the batteries and capacitors to full. We'll need everything we've got."

About David M. Kelly:

David M. Kelly writes intelligent,
action-packed science fiction. He is the author of the Joe Ballen sci-fi
thriller series and the short story collection Dead Reckoning And Other
Stories. He has been published in Canadian SF magazine Neo-opsis.

David’s interest in science and
technology began early. At the age of six his parents allowed him to stay up
late into the night to watch the television broadcast of Neil Armstrong
stepping on to the surface of the moon. From that day he was hooked on
everything related to science and space.

An avid reader, he worked his way
through the contents of the mobile library that visited his street, progressing
through YA titles (or ‘juveniles’ as they were known back then) on to the
classics of Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, and Harry
Harrison.

David worked for many years in
project management and software development. Along the way his interests have
included IPSC combat (target) pistol shooting, crew chief on a drag racing
team, and several years as bass player/vocalist in a heavy rock band. He also
managed to fit in some real work in manual jobs from digging ditches and work
on production lines to loading trucks in a haulage company.

Originally from the wild and woolly
region of Yorkshire, England, David emigrated to Canada in 2005 and settled in
Northern Ontario with his patient and supportive wife, Hilary. Foot surgery in
2014 temporarily curtailed many of his favourite activities – hiking, camping,
piloting his own personal starfighter (otherwise known as a Corvette ZR-1). But
on the plus side, it meant a transition from the world of IT into life as a
full-time writer—an opportunity he grasped enthusiastically.

David is passionate about science,
especially astronomy and physics, and is a rabid science news follower. Never
short of an opinion, David writes about science and technology on his blog
davidmkelly.net. He has supported various charity projects such as the
Smithsonian’s Reboot The Suit and the Lowell Observatory Pluto Telescope
Restoration. He also contributes to citizen science projects such as SETI@home.

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